I should have added that the leat to Foundry Mill can be traced back a considerable distancep; at least as far the former Pigeon Cote Farm at the very end of Bailey's Lane where it crosses the lane between the farm and Pigeon Cote Villa (to the immediate north of Seacroft Village).

In fact according much to my surprise this morning I realised as I browsed old-maps index map a small section of it remains (presumably as part of the urban drainage system) just to the west of the junction of Kentmere Rise and Kentmere Avenue

Sorry water from Wyke Beck from the weir at Eastfield Cottage could not reach Foundry Mill.

See the attached extracts from 1893 1:2500 OS maps

You will see that there is a road level noted very close to the Askett Hill Ford across the Wyke Beck of 189 feet Above Ordnance Datum. Note that these are levels above the weir at Eastfield Cottage. You will note that there are road levels and a bench mark on Foundry Lane in the immediate vicinity of the Foundry Mill which vary between 189 and 195 feet Above Ordnance Datum. It is also important to remember that Smeaton's waterwheel was overshot and had a diameter of 28 feet (Important this means it the leat supplying the mill had to be at a elevation at least 28 foot higher than the invert level of the beck flowing away from Foundry Mill).

Thanks for the reply.

The weir at Easterly Road on maps supplies a Mill Leat that heads for the Foundry Mill along the western rises of the Wyke beck valley in a channel.

The straightened Wyke beck on the eastern side of the valley today has remains on it north of Foxwood Farm that have the look of an old Mill. South of foxwod farm is the site of Cinder Hills to which a bloomery would be immediately adjacent.

We know of three "mills" (one a double mill). Foundry, Mathers and Bloomery and we have three sites with Foxwood Farm a red herring of mine.

Your brilliant work has settled the question of water power at the Foundry Mill from when Smeaton became involved in the project around 1780? This was some years after the Foundry Mill opened in 1725?

So I wholeheartedly agree that no water from Roundhay was ever used by Smeaton who engineered a new water power system for Foundry Mill.

I do still hold the idea that we must consider what the first water power system was in 1725 to see if we have a solution. The Easterly Road weir was built to deliver a mill leat in the direction of Foundry Mill in it's first incarnation. The power system failed at Foundry Mill and had to wait for Smeaton to re-engineer it considerably.

To me the weir at Easterly Road, the redundant length of channel heading from it towards the Foundry Mill, and Foundry Mill itself struggling for Water power pre-smeaton says one of the following.

1. A badly botched job in which after building a weir and starting a leat it was realised it simply would not get to the first wheel arrangement they had in 1725.

2. A less badly botched job in which they cut a leat all the way to the mill but it just didn't deliver the power.

3. No connection between the weirl and a dead end (on maps) Mill leat and the Foundry Mill.

The level at which the Easterly Road weir discharged water into the mill goit and the level at which the pre-Smeaton first waterwheel received it are the levels we need to have, to have a firm conclusion on the matter of whether they were ever related??????

You will see that there is a road level noted very close to the Askett Hill Ford across the Wyke Beck of 189 feet You will note that there are road levels and a bench mark on Foundry Lane in the immediate vicinity of the Foundry Mill which vary between 189 and 195 feet

Yes I see a level of 192.2 up asket hill above the beck/weir and a level of 189 on the other side below the beck/weir. Possibly the weir discharged at 190? Switching to Foundry Mill there is a level of 193.4 on Foundry lane.

Looking at the contours showing the lie of the land I think the mill is a few feet below the benchmark, in a shallow valley down from the level of the Lane at that Bench Mark. I am wondring if the first 1725 mill wheel was fed from a different angle and into say a breastfed wheel, sunk in a wheelpit, the levels of the weir in roundhay and feed to wheel at the Mill could be the same?

1780 and Smeaton changes to an overshot wheel and a feed from a completely different source and different level and higher angle rendering a possible leat from Roundhay redundant.

There's some debate about the likely source of the water running to the place.

This shows where the ponds (large square) and the mill/foundry (smaller square) were..........

I guess the picture of the Mill position hasn't popped up again only Chameleons quote, but those interested in this matter can find his excellent transposition of the old mill ponds and the Foundry mill onto the seacroft estate today on page 6 of the thread.

It's hard through Google or old maps to work out levels for deducing wether the proposed path of a watercourse from the weir at easterly Road to Foundry Mill is feasible so there's only one way to find out.....

FIELD TRIP

Off to the 194 feet bench mark on foundry Lane that is higher than the 188 feet bench mark by the weir. Water does not flow uphill.

However standing at that benchmark and looking to the mill site at the junction of Foundry Mill Street and Foundry Mill cescent one is actually looking downhill to the mill.

There is a short path dropping steeply to foundry mill walk in the direction of the mill site. Halfway down that path my head is level with the benchmark, once on Foundry Mill Walk I'm about 12 feet below the benchmark, and there's a further drop of several feet or more to the Mill.

I may be "level headed" but I'm not an expert at surveying levels, but I would sugest the mill lies at a very rough guess, 182 feet at the most.

The weir looks therefore to be several feet higher than the base of the Foundry Mill so it seems conceivable that the Roundhay Weir could have fed the original 1725 Foundry Mill waterheel (unsure about smeatons wheel) by a "mile long leat" in 1725, albeit it would seem the arrangement didn't work too well.

If this "works" in everyones mind then we possibly now know the sites of the Foundry Mill, Corn Mill and Bloomery, and the history and arrangements of the two watercourse systems that replaced the original wyke beck, and the third system that Smeaton inspired.

There's some debate about the likely source of the water running to the place.

This shows where the ponds (large square) and the mill/foundry (smaller square) were..........

I guess the picture of the Mill position hasn't popped up again only Chameleons quote, but those interested in this matter can find his excellent transposition of the old mill ponds and the Foundry mill onto the seacroft estate today on page 6 of the thread.

It's hard through Google or old maps to work out levels for deducing wether the proposed path of a watercourse from the weir at easterly Road to Foundry Mill is feasible so there's only one way to find out.....

FIELD TRIP

Off to the 194 feet bench mark on foundry Lane that is higher than the 188 feet bench mark by the weir. Water does not flow uphill.

However standing at that benchmark and looking to the mill site at the junction of Foundry Mill Street and Foundry Mill cescent one is actually looking downhill to the mill.

There is a short path dropping steeply to foundry mill walk in the direction of the mill site. Halfway down that path my head is level with the benchmark, once on Foundry Mill Walk I'm about 12 feet below the benchmark, and there's a further drop of several feet or more to the Mill.

I may be "level headed" but I'm not an expert at surveying levels, but I would sugest the mill lies at a very rough guess, 182 feet at the most.

The weir looks therefore to be several feet higher than the base of the Foundry Mill so it seems conceivable that the Roundhay Weir could have fed the original 1725 Foundry Mill waterheel (unsure about smeatons wheel) by a "mile long leat" in 1725, albeit it would seem the arrangement didn't work too well.

If this "works" in everyones mind then we possibly now know the sites of the Foundry Mill, Corn Mill and Bloomery, and the history and arrangements of the two watercourse systems that replaced the original wyke beck, and the third system that Smeaton inspired.

Indeed Parkie, and as in my email, give credence to the 'tunnel through the hill' idea. It would surely all work then. I think we.ve finally cracked it

(wondering if Mr Davison has come across a tunnel here at all Almost ironically, would have followed a similar course to the more recent lake storm-overflow).

If you class rothwell's fanny pit as east(ish) Leeds....then I went to the site some time after demolition and recovered some old pit building bricks.Oddly enough,they are embossed with the logo of the Ackton Hall colliery which of course was in Featherstone.Just a bit of prob useless trivia.......I still have those bricks though.

Apart.....now defunct Selby complex technically embraced an old leeds area pit in Gascoigne Wood at Sherburn-in-Elmet,part of a 5 mine complex,then the biggest undergound development in the world.Could never quite compute that the estimated development cost of c.£1.5-3 BILLION pounds yielded just 12 million tonnes of coal throughout it's life.....do the maths.Was this the start of the undoing of what is now UK Coal ???? Either way it was lunacy and only 11% of the entire projected reserves were ever earmarked for development.....the rest being left alone for various reasons which we will never fully understand.

If you class rothwell's fanny pit as east(ish) Leeds....then I went to the site some time after demolition and recovered some old pit building bricks.Oddly enough,they are embossed with the logo of the Ackton Hall colliery which of course was in Featherstone.Just a bit of prob useless trivia.......I still have those bricks though.

I too always give a look at old bricks to see the source. Several names of large post victorian brickyards recurr profusely.

Nice to find more obscure makers! Also I always look for "Middleton" and "Wortley" being a Leeds lad.

Sadly the wife won't let me have a brick collection on the mantel piece or window sill.

Mine(pun) are kept at top of cellar head.....interesting to hear of fellow brickies !

Not many of 'em about and becoming scarcer so worth hanging on to I guess..............

"Armitage" is very prolific. Also see LBC (leeds brick company - not sure where they were??????).

This week I had a bit of work done in which some bricks were removed from my garage wall and they said BRIGGS. I think these were from the Horsforth Brickworks on the Railway. There's no fireclay in Horsforth so looks like briggs shipped it in to make their own bricks to build Cookridge....

BRIGGS were as prolific as the MONE BROS today. I wonder what happened to them?